Memoirs of a Worldly Guy
'Reporting for service as ordered , sir!' I said, snapping a smart salute to my 'engine fitter'.
'Very pusser, I seem to have trained you well!' Dave smiled then introduced me to his father and mother. It was 8 a.m. and we were standing near the Texaco service station he had designated on Vancouver's North Shore. There was a 1939 Chevrolet standing just back of them which looked as though it had just come out of the dealer's showroom. The old couple looked as though they were both in their early eighties and their ruddy faces said 'farmer' loud and clear. The father was tall (a little more than six feet) and slim and was dressed as though headed for a church social, shirt and tie, pick and pick suit and dark brown brogues. He topped it all off with a light brown straw fedora hat. He probably weighed about 175 pounds. His wife was portly, very portly, and I guessed weighed close to 200 pounds. Considering that the top of her head only came as high as his shoulder I guess it wouldn't have been unfair to qualify her as 'fat.'.
'The car's had a complete checkup so you shouldn't have any problems,' Dave said. 'Dad's got a ration book and a Texaco credit card you can use for gas and oil; you might want to get gas whenever the gauge gets down around a quarter full just to be on the safe side. The spare tire's brand new by the way and it's been checked.'
'Sounds perfect,' I said.
'You can throw your bag in the trunk if you like and then be on your way.' he said then leaned into the car and said goodbye to his folks who were already sitting patiently side by side in the back seat.
'Right, then! Off you go, good luck and drive keerful!'
'You haven't got a thing to worry about!' I said confidently, 'They'll be as safe as a church!' I pulled slowly out of the gas station and drove about a mile up the service road to the railway crossing where I promptly drove into the ditch. Some church! There was not a sound from the pair in the back; perhaps they assumed that this was the traditional way of crossing railway tracks! I just backed the car onto the road again and took another run at the crossing. Murphy must have been asleep that day or else I would have stalled the car on the tracks with an approaching train in the offing.
There was no Trans-Canada Highway in those days and the roads between Calgary and Vancouver through Alberta and B.C. were daunting. As a result Canadian travellers moving any distance east or west immediately headed for the United States to make use of the paved roads south of the border.
The United States Customs and Immigration building at the border was unmistakable! A large, freshly-painted, colonnaded building, it was proudly showing the stars and stripes at the top of a tall flagpole. The old folks didn't have passports but as soon as they showed their identification they were passed through without trouble. I had a new passport on me so was even less of a concern.
'Is it far to the Canadian Customs?' I asked one of the American officers.
'Nah, jest a whoop and a holler down the road a piece! Ya can't miss it!'
WRONG! I drove down the road at moderate speed looking for the Canadian Customs building but when I hadn't seen it after a couple of miles I assumed the American had been thinking in terms of a 'country whoop and a holler piece' and sped up to my normal speed. I was barreling along at about 70 mph four or five miles later when I thought I heard a siren. I was right; I had heard a siren! I pulled over and stopped as a brown Canadian government car drove by me and stopped. A lanky Canadian Customs officer with a slight smile on his face stepped out and walked back to where I was parked.
'Aren't you even going to stop and say hello to us?' he said with an even wider smile.
'Exactly what I plan to do when I find you,' I said. I had obviously been spoiled by the grandiose American Customs Building.
'I guess you just weren't looking hard enough,' he said with a slight flush of embarrassment. 'If you'd be kind enough to turn around and follow me I'll lead you back to where we do business.' Easy for him to say!
We were on a mountainside road not much more than the width of two cars. He made a wide swing to the far side, reversed back to the inside and took off unconcernedly. I was scared shitless! If I tried to make as wide a swing as he had I was afraid I would screw up and go too far. I swung about two- thirds of the way across, stopped, then reversed back to the inside. As a result I was engaged in my cautious procedure for about five minutes, praying all the while that a large produce truck would not appear on the scene. The Canada Customs car was still visible when I finally started back, right leg still shaking slightly, and eventually saw it turn down to a small brown building not much bigger than a double garage. This was our Customs Building? Now I was embarrassed! Oh, the shame of it all! After a closer look at our motley group the officer obviously concluded that we were unlikely to be smuggling anything of significance and sent us on our way. We headed south toward Seattle and cut off to the east at Everett.There was very little tourist traffic on the highway as a result of gas rationing and we needed only to contend with the occasional large produce truck. I had soon convinced myself that I was a skilled driver with little more to learn and was barreling casually along at seventy miles an hour. How little I knew!
It doesn't look very far on a small map but we had travelled quite far into Washington State before we reached a road that gave us a clear run to the east. I can't remember if it was in Wenatchee or Spokane that I encountered my first really steep hill. I figured that if I just stayed in third gear I might merely slow down therefore that did not present a problem. I slowed down all right, in fact I slowed down until the car stalled half way up the main street in town! Fortunately I had the wit to stamp on the foot brake to prevent us from rocketing back down the hill at high speed. After a few moments of careful thought I depressed the clutch, shifted the car into neutral and turned the ignition switch. To my immense relief it hadn't flooded and the engine started up readily. All I had to do now was to get into low gear then let out the clutch slowly while gradually speeding up the engine and we would be under way. Simple! Or was it?
I soon realized that to depress the accelerator I would have to remove my foot from the brake with the daunting possibility of a terrifying high speed backward version of what the old-time whaler's referred to as the 'Nantucket Sleigh Ride' but with gravity instead of a sperm whale doing all the work! What to do? What to do? I had a sudden rush of shit to my brain--Of course!--the emergency brake, what else! I reached down and pulled on it with more force than was really needed then gradually took my foot off the brake pedal. Eureka! Success! The car remained stationary with the engine purring steadily. Thank you, whoever's up there in charge of automotive functions, I whispered under my breath with a glance skyward. With the car in low gear I executed the necessary and we were soon under way once more. It's called 'learning by doing' I guess.
'Does anyone want to stop for a bit of lunch? I asked as we approached a roadside restaurant.
'That would be all right,' said the old fellow. His wife was silent but I assumed she wouldn't object. I pulled into the restaurant and parked.
'You still serving the breakfast?' asked the old fellow. I noticed that he was still wearing his straw hat.
'Whatever you like!' said the waitress.
'Right! I'll have the bacon and eggs, lots of crisp bacon if you got it and I'd like three eggs over easy if that's all right, brown toast and coffee.'
'You want home fries or hashed browns?'
'I like them hashed browns!'
To my surprise the old girl asked about salads and finally settled on fruit salad with dry toast! An unending and ineffectual diet program? I ordered a grilled cheese sandwich and a glass of milk.
'Separate checks!' the old girl snapped as the waitress left our table.
When the food arrived I watched with amazement as the eggs and the greasy mound of hash browns received a thick layer of salt followed by a similar coating of pepper. The bacon was subsequently covered with a layer of tomato ketchup. So much for high blood pressure warnings!
We continued east without incident and without conversation and eventually passed out of Washington into northern Idaho. Dave's Dad was still wearing his suit coat and straw hat; a real laid back guy!
We spent the night in some cool (as in cold) cabins at Elko and headed out early the next morning and reached Claresholm in the early afternoon. There was an Elementary Flying Training School (EFTS) at Claresholm as part of the Commonwealth Training and one of Dave's sisters was married to a young man in the Training School. After some driving around asking questions we found the 'jerry built' accommodation in which they were living. It was mid-afternoon and their son-in-law was not due home for another three hours. The mom' headed straight for the can after the preliminary hugs and kisses.
As I say, the accommodation was 'jerry built' and the toilet was only about eight feet away, directly adjoining the living room in which were seated. I can still remember the embarrassing difficulty of trying to carry on a three-way conversation while ignoring the sound of the thunderous fartings and plotchings of the old girl. I marvelled at her ability to hold herself sealed for so long without requesting an emergency stop or to have had a sudden disastrous sanitary catastrophe.
Following tea and cookies and half an hour of catch-up gossiping the old folks announced that they would like to get as far as the Alberta-Saskatchewan border that night so we were soon on our way once again. The stopover in Calgary was even more brief and after a short conversation with my mother the folks were on their way to Saskatchewan once more with the old gentleman driving.
I was just seventeen, home again, and had some cash in my jeans! All I had to do was get through four more years at University and I'd be real grown up! Or so I thought!
— The End —